Massachusetts may have been ranked by Gallup as the 13th state out of 50 when it comes to overall well-being but when we narrow our focus to Boston, things become a bit more iffy. We have nothing against Boston, you understand. But for some people not quite as fortunate or economically stable, this is a serious problem. So serious, in fact, is the issue at hand that Boston has been designated the fourth most unequal city in the country.

Nonprofit public policy organization Brookings compiled data from the U.S. Census Bureau and found that the cities with the highest degree of economic disparity are Atlanta, San Francisco, Miami, Boston and Washington D.C.. Using income data applied to the 95/20 ratio – a means of comparing households that earn more than 95 percent of other households, while on the flip side comparing households that earn more than just 20 percent of other households – shows that the 95th percentile earns 15.3 percent more money than than the 20th.

It’s important to keep in mind that, as noted by Brookings, not ” all unequal cities are created equally.” Huh?

“Compare San Francisco and Miami, which have similar 95/20 ratios. San Francisco’s ratio is high because its wealthy households have very high incomes, considerably higher than in any other major city. Miami’s ratio is high primarily because its poor households have very low incomes, third-lowest among the 50 largest cities,” writes Brookings.

In the case of Boston, industries like higher-education, healthcare, technology, etc. help propel the upper-echelon of earners high above the average, taking in $223,838 while the the 20th percentile earn a paltry $14,604 which is below the poverty line for a household of two.

This is something that Boston Mayor Marty Walsh plans on going into battle against, intent on helping those in the most dire of straits, expanding the middle class, and keeping Boston’s business engine firing on all cylinders.

“We are in a time where cities are driving policy nationally,” says Walsh’s policy chief, Joyce Linehan to WBUR.“At a time when Congress can’t really seem to get much done, cities are out here dealing with the day-to-day.” And that’s what we’re likely to see from Mayor Walsh’s newly anointed administration, him taking the economics of Boston into his own hands for the betterment of the general public.

“We cannot tolerate a city,” he said in his inaugural address last month, “divided by privilege and poverty.”